Where's the Apology?(Major Dry Heave Alert)

eorge Bush promised to bring honor and integrity back to the White House. Instead, he got rid of accountability.

Surely even supporters of the Iraq war must be dismayed by the administration's reaction to David Kay's recent statements. Iraq, he now admits, didn't have W.M.D., or even active programs to produce such weapons. Those much-ridiculed U.N. inspectors were right. (But Hans Blix appears to have gone down the memory hole. On Tuesday Mr. Bush declared that the war was justified — under U.N. Resolution 1441, no less — because Saddam "did not let us in.")

So where are the apologies? Where are the resignations? Where is the investigation of this intelligence debacle? All we have is bluster from Dick Cheney, evasive W.M.D.-related-program-activity language from Mr. Bush — and a determined effort to prevent an independent inquiry.

True, Mr. Kay still claims that this was a pure intelligence failure. I don't buy it: the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace has issued a damning report on how the threat from Iraq was hyped, and former officials warned of politicized intelligence during the war buildup. (Yes, the Hutton report gave Tony Blair a clean bill of health, but many people — including a majority of the British public, according to polls — regard that report as a whitewash.)

In any case, the point is that a grave mistake was made, and America's credibility has been badly damaged — and nobody is being held accountable. But that's standard operating procedure. As far as I can tell, nobody in the Bush administration has ever paid a price for being wrong. Instead, people are severely punished for telling inconvenient truths. And administration officials have consistently sought to freeze out, undermine or intimidate anyone who might try to check up on their performance.

Let's look at three examples. First is the Valerie Plame affair. When someone in the administration revealed that Ms. Plame was an undercover C.I.A. operative, one probable purpose was to intimidate intelligence professionals. And whatever becomes of the Justice Department investigation, the White House has been notably uninterested in finding the culprit. ("We have let the earthmovers roll in over this one," a senior White House official told The Financial Times.)

Then there's the stonewalling about 9/11. First the administration tried, in defiance of all historical precedents, to prevent any independent inquiry. Then it tried to appoint Henry Kissinger, of all people, to head the investigative panel. Then it obstructed the commission, denying it access to crucial documents and testimony. Now, thanks to all the delays and impediments, the panel's head says it can't deliver its report by the original May 11 deadline — and the administration is trying to prevent a time extension.

Finally, an important story that has largely evaded public attention: the effort to prevent oversight of Iraq spending. Government agencies normally have independent, strictly nonpartisan inspectors general, with broad powers to investigate questionable spending. But the new inspector general's office in Iraq operates under unique rules that greatly limit both its powers and its independence.

And the independence of the Pentagon's own inspector general's office is also in question. Last September, in a move that should have caused shock waves, the administration appointed L. Jean Lewis as the office's chief of staff. Ms. Lewis played a central role in the Whitewater witch hunt (seven years, $70 million, no evidence of Clinton wrongdoing); nobody could call her nonpartisan. So when Mr. Bush's defenders demand hard proof of profiteering in Iraq — as opposed to extensive circumstantial evidence — bear in mind that the administration has systematically undermined the power and independence of institutions that might have provided that proof.

And there are many more examples. These people politicize everything, from military planning to scientific assessments. If you're with them, you pay no penalty for being wrong. If you don't tell them what they want to hear, you're an enemy, and being right is no excuse.

Still, the big story isn't about Mr. Bush; it's about what's happening to America. Other presidents would have liked to bully the C.I.A., stonewall investigations and give huge contracts to their friends without oversight. They knew, however, that they couldn't. What has gone wrong with our country that allows this president to get away with such things?

"accountability" is the new mantra of the left.

I just got back from the U.K. where the BBC is attacking Blair's Iraq war support. Apparently, there was a shortage of flack jackets. One soldier wrote home that he had to give up his jacket for someone in a more forward position. After the soldier without the flack jacket was killed, his wife was on the news constantly demanding "accountability" for the shortage of jackets.

For every person who dies in Iraq, someone must step forward and take responsibility! [Of course, let's just ignore which side usually votes against military expenditures to allow the stockpiling of things like flack jackets during times of peace.]

Krugman is juvenile in his analysis, as always. He is part of the problem, at least ideologically. The previous administration had access to exactly the same information that Krugman distorts here, and failed to act on it. As a result of Clinton's calculated inaction and vacillation, we all suffered the one trillion dollar hit on our economy, and the loss of 3000+ innocent civilians that was the Islamofascist cabal's attack on the US... 9/11. It easily could have been prevented, had Clinton acted upon any number of leads and opportunities that were literally handed to him. He chose not to, out of political expediency. He knew the dangers of actually "doing something" about terrorism, and chose instead his standard procedure of talking about it, and doing very little. Combine this with clear ineptitude and his moral cowardice, and there is little wonder why Osama Bin Laden was encouraged in his plan to destroy the World Trade Center, completing the job first botched by his and Saddam's first effort in 1993.

What we see here is Presidential campaign year rhetoric, not reasoned analysis of the realities of the War on Terrorism. As a defense analyst, Krugman is little more than a political shill. He repeats the illogical and already discredited campaign one liners of Dean and Kucinich, and then swallows them whole. If Bush knew there were no WMD, then Clinton did too. Gore did too. Kerry did too. Anyone who got the high level briefing about US WMD intel, had the same information to work with that the president acted upon. And there is the difference. Bush actually did something. He actually tried to defend the nation. Clinton talked, and did little if anything else. Thus, we had the WTC disaster, and Saddam continued with his "wait out the sanctions" strategy, counting on the useful idiots in the West, like Krugman, and his paid spokesmen, like Galloway and Ritter.

Krugman is counting on the ignorance of facts, and dim power of reasoning his supporters must be equipped with, in order to argue that Bush owes us an apology. He does not take into account the removal of Saddam, the drastic change in attitude and policy of Libya, and and the softening in stance of Iran and North Korea, as positive outcomes of the Iraq battle in the War on Terror. He fails to recognize that there even IS a War on Terror. He fails to honestly recount what Kay actually said. He fails on all counts. If Krugman was national security advisor today, Saddam would still be in power, the "sanctions-in-name only" would be virtually defunct, and the WMD production labs Kay found evidence of, would gear up to begin the production of next years "Al Qaida Surprise". But that is next year, too far into the future to care about. Much like the attitude Clinton expressed when he failed to act upon any of the 3 reported opportunities he was offered custody of Osama Bin Laden. Krugman will deny any accountability when more Americans die as a result of restoration of Clinton's head-in-the-sand approach to anti US and anti Western terrorism. Thus, accountability will not exactly be a concern of his, only the political future of the leftist Democrat Party. Where will his apology be for putting political expediency ahead of national security, as always?

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